Mary Clark - We'll Meet Again

She looked at Wally’s untouched dinner plate. Wally’s appetite was usually very good, and tonight in an effort to appease him, she had prepared a favorite meal-veal chops, asparagus, and mashed potatoes. But instead of eating, he’d sat at the table, muttering to himself, his attitude surly. The voices inside his head were talking to him tonight. Edna could tell, and it worried her.

The phone rang. She was sure that it was Marta; she had to make a quick decision. It would have been nice to have a quiet cup of tea with Marta, but it wasn’t a good idea tonight. If Wally started talking again about the key, and about the night Dr. Lasch died, Marta might start taking him seriously.

It’s probably all just his imagination, Edna told herself, an assurance she had made every time Wally mentioned the night of the murder. And if it isn’t “just his imagination”? she wondered fleetingly, then dismissed the thought. Even if he was there, what happened that night surely wasn’t his fault. The phone was ringing for the fourth time, so she finally picked it up.

It had been a struggle for Marta Jones to dial Edna’s number. She had decided that she’d better warn Edna about her telling Wally that it was okay for him to say good-bye to Molly Lasch. She was going to suggest that maybe tomorrow morning on the way out of town, Edna could drop by Molly’s house and let Wally speak to her. That would satisfy him, Marta was sure.

When Edna answered the phone, she said, “I just thought I’d run over and say good-bye to you and Wally, if that’s all right.”

Edna had her answer prepared. “Marta, to tell you the truth I’m so far behind on getting packed and organized that I’d better not even let you in the door right now. The minute I take a break and sit down, I know I’ll be useless to do anything more tonight. How about coming over in the morning and having some breakfast with us?”

Well, I can’t force myself on her, Marta thought, and she does sound tired. I do hate to upset her. “Sounds good,” she said with forced cheerfulness. “Is Wally helping you, I hope?”

“Wally’s already upstairs in his room, watching television,” Edna said. “He’s had one of his difficult days, so I’m going to put an extra dose of his medicine in warm milk and take it up to him now.”

“Oh, then he’ll be sure to get some rest,” Marta agreed. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

She hung up, relieved to think that Wally was safely in his own room and would soon be asleep. I guess he gave up on the notion of seeing Molly tonight, Marta decided. One less thing for her to worry about.

Among the lead stories for that night’s evening news was the death of Natasha Colbert after six years in an irreversible coma, followed by the death, less than twenty-four hours later, of her mother, socialite and philanthropist Barbara Canon Colbert.

Fran sat at her desk in the studio and watched with somber eyes as the pictures flashed on the screen-Tasha, radiant and alive, with flaming red hair; her handsome, elegant mother. Peter Black killed both of you, Fran thought, although realistically, I may never be able to prove it.

She had spoken to Philip Matthews and heard his grim prediction that Molly almost certainly would be back in prison by Monday afternoon. “I spoke to her shortly after you left, Fran,” Philip said. “Then I called Dr. Daniels. He’s going over to see her this evening; he agrees that if she’s taken into custody at the parole board meeting on Monday, she’ll probably have a complete collapse. I’ll be with her, of course, and he wants to be there as well, just to be on the safe side.”

This is one time I hate my job, Fran thought as she received the signal that she was on air: “The Connecticut parole board has called an emergency session for Monday afternoon, suggesting the strong probability that Molly Carpenter Lasch will be returned to prison to finish serving the time left on her original ten-year sentence in the death of her husband, Dr. Gary Lasch.”

She ended her report by saying, “In the past year in this country, three convicted killers have been exonerated of the crimes for which they were imprisoned, because of either new evidence or the confession of the real culprit. Molly Lasch’s attorney has vowed a ceaseless fight to overturn or vacate her plea, as well as to prove that she is innocent of the charge of murder filed against her in the death of Annamarie Scalli.”

With a sigh of relief, Fran unhooked her microphone and got up. She had reached the station barely in time to go into makeup and put on a fresh jacket. She hadn’t had time to do more than wave to Tim as she rushed onto the set. A commercial was running between their spots, and he called out to her, “Fran, wait for me. I want to talk to you.”

On her way into the studio she had dropped the magazines Molly gave her on her desk, and she hadn’t done more than merely glimpse at the material on Lasch and Whitehall that she’d requested from the research department. Now, while she waited for Tim, she reached for it, eager to get started.

Skimming through the research material, she could see that the pages on both Calvin Whitehall and Dr. Gary Lasch seemed detailed and extremely thorough. It looks like research has pulled out all the stops in this one, she thought gratefully. I have a hunch I’ll be doing a lot of reading tonight.

“You must plan to do a lot of reading.”

Fran looked up. Tim was at the door. “Make a wish fast,” she told him. “You just said exactly what I was thinking, and when that happens, you get whatever you wish for.”

“I never heard that one, but anyhow it’s easy to do. Here goes: I wish you’d have a hamburger with me. How’s that?” he asked with a laugh. “I was on the phone with my mother earlier today, and when I told her I let you pay for dinner the other night, she yelled at me. She said she doesn’t agree with this business of men and women splitting checks unless it’s a business appointment or a case of dire financial necessity. She said that with my paycheck and total lack of responsibilities, I shouldn’t be so chintzy.” He grinned. “I think she was right.”

“I’m not sure about that, but yes, I’d love to have a hamburger-if you don’t mind making it a fast one.” Fran pointed to the stack of files and magazines. “I need to start working my way through all this stuff tonight.”

“I was sorry to hear about the parole board emergency session. That’s not good for Molly, is it?”

“No, it isn’t.”

“How’s the investigation going?”

Fran hesitated. “There’s something terribly wrong, even bizarre, going on at Lasch Hospital, but in all fairness, since I don’t have a shred of proof yet, I shouldn’t even talk about it.”

“Maybe you should take a break from it anyhow,” Tim suggested. “P.J.’s okay with you?”

“You bet, and I’ll be home in two minutes from there.”

With an easy motion, Tim picked up the magazines and research data from her desk. “You want all this stuff?”

“Yes. I’ll have the whole weekend to wade through it.”

“Sounds like fun. Let’s go.”

Over hamburgers at P. J. Clarke’s they discussed baseball-the start of spring training and the strengths and weaknesses of the various players and teams. “I’d better be careful. You could take over the sports desk,” Tim told her as he paid the check.

“I might do a better job there than I’m doing right now,” Fran responded wryly.

Tim insisted on seeing Fran to her apartment. “I’m not going to let you carry all this stuff,” he said. “You’d break your arm. But I assure you I’ll get right out.”

As they left the elevator on her floor he mentioned the deaths of Natasha and Barbara Colbert. “I jog in the morning,” he said. “And today, while I was enjoying a run, I started thinking how Tasha Colbert went out one morning to jog, just like I do, and she tripped and fell and never had another thought.”